The Chairperson of Nigerians in the Diaspora Commission, Abike Dabiri-Erewa, has said that the commission does not deal have anything to do with funds used for evacuating Nigerians from crisis-torn Sudan. She made this known to journalists on Thursday in Abuja after some Nigerians being evacuated from Sudan complained that the drivers of the buses paid to evacuate them stopped in the desert because the Federal Government had not paid them for their services. Dabiri-Erewa said that about 1,500 Nigerians are expected to arrive in Egypt, after which Air Peace Airline will depart for Egypt to transport them into the country.
She said, “ NiDCOM as an agency, we don’t know anything about funding. As I told you, even in the Ukraine crisis, some funds were released but not a kobo came to the Diaspora Commission. I can’t talk about funding because we don’t get funded for all these that we do. We just do our job. So you just need to ask the Ministry of Humanitarian Affairs and the National Emergency Management Agency.
“All I know is that the buses conveying students back, right now they are saying that if you don’t pay us cash, they are not leaving. So that is a problem. 13 buses will soon be arriving. That is what I am going to address now. As I speak to you, we are expecting about 1,500 Nigerians. Air Peace would be leaving tonight from Nigeria to pick them up from Egypt and bring them back safely to Nigeria by tomorrow. 13 buses have gone and about 1500 people have already left.”
However, in a tweet answering the same queries directed at her on the viral video that showed evacuees complaining of being in the middle of nowhere while bus drivers refused to continue the journey, she said the issue has been resolved.